43. I Had Some Motivation
I HAD SOME MOTIVATION
ANNELISA
As soon as I land at Heathrow, I put the UK sim back in my phone and dial my agent.
“Hi Danielle,” I say, wheeling my suitcase through the crowded airport.
“Well, if it isn’t my most in demand and hard to reach author,” Danielle Chambers replies, her polished British accent doing nothing to hide the sarcasm dripping from every word.
I cringe. “Yep, that’s me. I have a first draft for you.”
“Really?” Her voice perks up. “I thought you’d been struggling?”
I bite my thumb nail. “Well… It’s not the one you were hoping for,” I say.
She tsks. “Annelisa,” she starts, and I can hear the frustration in her voice.
“Look, I know that they were after a story that was more like my old stuff, but I think what I’ve come up with is better… A blend of both, I guess you could say.”
“Hm.” She doesn’t sound convinced, and I don’t blame her .
I’ve not been able to provide her with much in recent years, and I’m not sure that the publishers will go for it, but I have to at least try.
Since returning from the camping trip, it was like the words were pouring out of me, and the two days of travel to get back here gave me ample time to finish the last of it.
I’ve never written a first draft so quickly in my life, and it’s in very rough shape, but aside from the date with Will, I didn’t leave the apartment all week.
I guess it goes to show what I can achieve when I have the right motivation.
“Listen, I’m back in town. Can I send it over to you now and meet up in an hour?” I ask, coming to a stop outside the entrance to the Tube station.
“You want me to read it in an hour?” she asks.
“No, I’ve put together an overview for you.
Hopefully that will be enough for you to decide if it’s worth putting it to them as an option.
If they hate it, I have started what they’ve asked for, and I think now that I’ve got this other one out of me, I can probably get it done pretty quick. But… I’m really confident in this one.”
I know this request is definitely outside of what is normally done, and that I’m probably pushing my luck. But I believe in this concept so much that I’m prepared to return the advance the publisher had sent me and find someone else if they don’t go for it.
Danielle is quiet for a few moments, before letting out a heavy sigh. “I swear, if you were any of my other authors, I’d be washing my hands of you. You’re lucky I love you.”
I resist the overwhelming urge to jump for joy, knowing that would upset the sensibilities of the English travellers around me.
“Perfect.”
“Meet me at the pub around the corner from my office. I get the feeling I’m going to need something stronger than tea while you explain all of this to me.”
We hang up, and after I hit send on the email I drafted on the plane, I follow the crowd down to the Tube .
It’s close to the hour mark when I get to Covent Garden, wishing I’d thought to give myself time to get back to the flat and dump my suitcase before my meeting.
And probably a shower. A shower would have been a really good idea.
Resigning myself to the fact that I’m about to enter an important meeting looking like crap, I push the door of the small pub open and spot Danielle immediately, sitting in a booth with two glasses of white wine in front of her.
A tall blonde woman in her early forties, she is dressed in one of her many designer outfits that perfectly fit her curves. I’ve long admired her impeccable sense of style, and know that even with time for a shower, I still would have looked far less put together than her.
I make my way over and throw myself down in the booth across from her, pulling my suitcase in close so that it’s out of the way of anyone walking by.
“Well… I see you came straight from the airport?” she says, glancing at the suitcase before running her eyes over my unkempt appearance.
“Yep,” I reply, figuring there’s no point in denying I look like a hot mess.
My hair is long overdue for a wash and my skin feels incredibly oily, regardless of the powder I’d put on to make do on the plane.
She pushes one of the glasses across the table.
“Oh, is that mine? I just assumed you were getting started early,” I say.
“Cheeky,” she replies, raising an eyebrow while she leans back in her seat and surveys me closely. “So… I read your brief… and started the first few chapters.”
“That was quick.” I bring the glass to my lips and take a sip. “What did you think?”
“It’s definitely rough… But I can see the potential. Ar e you sure you want me to put this to them? You don’t have anything else?”
“I do but… I believe in this one so much more.”
She sighs. “Well, I guess we can try.”
“You don’t seem convinced?”
“Well… It’s just… They’ve voiced their concerns about how long it was taking, as you know. And this isn’t quite what they were asking for.” She taps the stack of papers on the table next to her.
I realise she’s printed the manuscript out already, and I try not to pay attention to how many notes she’s scribbled on the front page.
“I feel really good about this one. And I promise, if they accept it, I’ll be able to work on the others for them. This was just the story that I needed to tell first.”
“And you’re sure you don’t want to do this under your other pen name and publish it yourself?”
I shake my head. “No. This one needs to be Selena.”
“Okay. Give me a couple of days, okay?” She takes a sip of her wine as she pulls another stack of papers in a file out of her bag. “I printed you off a copy, too. Figured you’d want to do your usual second run through?”
I often get her to print out my manuscripts to save my aging printer from trying to churn out a few hundred pages.
“Thanks,” I say, sliding the folder into my oversized handbag.
We spend the next half an hour discussing changes she thinks I need to make, before she finally takes pity on me and tells me to go home. I must look worse than I thought, because she can usually spend hours ripping apart my work. It’s part of her charm.
I catch the Tube back to the flat that I’ve called home for the last five years. I’d fallen in love with the light filled apartment in Notting Hill, which seemed worth the crazy price to rent a single room. It had also helped that my flatmates were friendly and easy to get along with.
Until I’d returned home, I’d thought that my flatmates were my friends, but judging by the text messages from Sebastian, they haven’t missed me much and just want me out so that Maggie’s sister can move in.
Neither of them appear to be home from work yet, which I’m grateful for. After two days of travel and then my meeting with Danielle, the last thing I feel like is being social. I just want to have a shower and take the world longest nap.
After messaging Sebastian to let him know I’m back, I take a shower before collapsing onto my bed, falling asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow.
When I wake up, it’s pitch-black outside, and I smack my hand around until I find my phone. The screen lights up the room, and I have to squint to look at it while my eyes adjust.
4 a.m. Fantastic.
I groan as I unlock the screen, cursing myself for not setting an alarm so that I could at least attempt some form of normal sleep routine.
I’d switched it to Do Not Disturb once I’d spoken to Danielle, not wanting to deal with anything I might have missed while I was away. But when I unlock it, I see that I have several missed calls and text messages.
Noticing that most of the missed calls are from Tara and Mum, I check the messages with growing apprehension. I open Tara’s first, and the first unread message causes me to draw in a sharp breath.
Tara
Will was just here. What the hell, Lis? You ran away again?
I swallow hard. Will had been so angry when he’d left that I figured I had at least a week where I could get myself sorted out here and get back home to make things right with him before he came looking for me. After seven years of radio silence, I hadn’t expected him to seek me out within hours…
The message chain continues on, her messages growing more and more angry.
Doing a quick calculation on time difference, I dial her number, knowing a message isn’t going to cut it.
The phone barely rings before she picks up. “Finally,” she says.
I can hear the anger in her voice, and marvel at how scary one word can sound.
“I didn’t run away,” I say, not bothering with any pleasantries.
“Could have fooled all of us. Will showed up to get me to talk to you, and then we discovered you high-tailed it out of here the second things got hard again.”
Yep, she’s really angry.
“That’s not what I was doing. After I spoke to Chris, I knew that I needed to do something big to show Will that I’m in this for the long-haul,” I say, trying to keep my voice quiet so as not to wake Sebastian and Maggie.
“And getting on a plane shows that how, exactly?” Some of the anger has eased in her tone, but I can tell she’s not following my logic.
“By getting back here to pack up my life, give up my apartment and come home. No one was meant to notice I was gone.”
“My God… Sometimes I really do wonder how people consider you to be the smart sister,” she says with a sigh.
While I’m readying my defence, I hear Kylie’s voice in the background and freeze.
“Is that Annelisa? Give me the phone.”
I assume Tara has covered the microphone, cause I can’t hear her response, but there appears to be a bit of a scuffle, before Kylie’s voice comes down the line.
“What in the actual fuck, Annelisa? This was meant to be my relaxing time of year. Instead, your shenanigans have just kept getting more and more dramatic. I’ve spent the last few weeks hoping you wouldn’t stomp all over my brother’s heart again. And whaddya know… You did it.”
I close my eyes and squeeze the bridge of my nose. “It’s not like that, Kylie. I came back here to pack up my life and move back to Brisbane.”
“Oh,” she replies, all the rage falling from her tone.
“Yeah. Oh.”
“Well… He doesn’t know that, and now he’s on a plane, so what are you going to do about this?” she demands.
I sit up, clutching the phone to my ear. “What do you mean, he’s on a plane?”
Kylie hesitates, and I get the sense she’s said more than she was supposed to when I hear a smack in the background.
This is confirmed when I hear my sister say, “Well done, big mouth.”
It’s nice to see how much we’ve all grown up in the last sixteen years.
“Kylie… Where is Will flying to?”
She sighs. “Look… I wasn’t meant to say anything, but I was all worked up and it just slipped out. He’s… He’s coming to London.”
“He’s what?!” I’ve forgotten all about keeping quiet now. “When did he leave?”
“Sunday morning.”
I try to do the math in my head. Damn time changes.
“Wait… so he’s going to be here tomorrow?”
“Yep.”
I chew my nail for a moment while I try to work out what to do next. I had a whole plan. I needed this week to get everything sorted so that I could make this big, grand entrance and hopefully undo the damage I’d caused on Saturday morning. Now I have less than twenty-four hours to work it out .
He needs to see that I’m choosing him. Not that he’s coming to try and talk me into staying.
“Kylie, has he booked a hotel?”
There’s silence on the other end, then Morgan’s voice comes through. “We booked him a hotel near you.” It sounds like I’m on speaker now.
I swallow. “Are you all there?”
Morgan snorts. “What do you think? We were all ready to lose our shit at you, but now it seems like we just need to help you.”
“His flight is getting in late and we told him he should get some sleep before he just showed up,” Chris calls out.
“Oh great, the guys are there too, are they?”
This is all just getting so messy.
“Bri and me are here too!” Jake hollers out.
I sigh. “And Aiden and Seth?”
“Present,” Aiden replies at the same time Seth says “Hi Annelisa.”
I imagine they are surrounded by all their offspring as well.
I nod, before remembering that no one can see me. “Okay, well seeing as it’s one big happy family, I need you to help me. What’s the hotel?”
We get to work on my new plan and now I just have to wait a few more hours before I can start to put it all into action.